As part of its portion of the TCA winter tour in Pasadena, Fox announced that it’s Animation Domination High-Def will debut Saturday, July 27 and run from 11 PM-12:30 AM. The alternative animated programming block will feature quarter-hour series Axe Cop, High School USA! and the untitled Lucas Brothers project. Six quarter hours have been ordered for the series, the on-air component of Fox’s digital animation network, which encompasses online, mobile apps, game consoles and VOD and acts as an incubator for animated fare that can transition to the network. Here are Fox’s descriptions of the shows:
Axe Cop
From the unfettered imagination of a five-year-old boy comes Axe Cop, an action-comedy about the most badass superhero who ever existed! Operating on only two minutes of sleep a night and fueled by a diet consisting solely of birthday cake, Axe Cop and his loyal partner, Flute Cop, unleash their unique brand of vigilante justice on bad guys everywhere – including stopping Hitler from creating an army of evil zombie robots and helping BAT WARTHOG MAN find the villain who stole all his best friends! AXE COP is the unique comic phenomenon created and written by Malachai Nicolle (age five) and his brother, Ethan Nicolle (age 30). What started as a small passion project between two brothers quickly evolved into an online sensation and was later published as a graphic novel by Dark Horse Books. Axe Cop was developed for television by Nick Weidenfeld and Judah Miller (American Dad). Matt Silverstein and Dave Jeser (“Drawn Together”) serve as executive producers/showrunners. The series ensemble cast includes Megan Mullally (“Children’s Hospital,” “Will & Grace”), Patton Oswalt (“Young Adult,” “Ratatouille”), Ken Marino (“Children’s Hospital,” “Party Down”), Peter Serafinowicz (“Shaun of the Dead”) and weekly guest stars such as Giancarlo Esposito (“Revolution”); rapper Tyler, The Creator; Jonathan Banks (“Breaking Bad”); Rob Huebel (“Despicable Me”); and Dan Harmon (“Community”).
High School USA!
Join the super-positive, millennial students of High School USA!, as they confront all the unique challenges of growing up in a modern world. Led by the painfully naïve and always upbeat Marsh Merriwether, there is nothing these kids can’t put a positive spin on, from cyber-bullying to Adderall-addiction to embarrassing sexting incidents. High School USA! is created and written by Dino Stamatopoulos (“Community,” “Mr. Show,” “TV Funhouse” and “Moral Orel”), and features an all-star cast including Vincent Kartheiser (“Mad Men”) and Mandy Moore (“Tangled”).
Untitled Lucas Brothers Project
The stand-up comedy of New York-based identical twins Kenny and Keith Lucas (The Lucas Brothers) gets animated. After their uncle dies and leaves them his old van, the twins start a moving company called Va¢ation Boy$. Their customers are often apprehensive to hire such a scrawny duo, but the brothers like to remind them that that’s why God made two of them. A day that begins simply by moving a bed down the street may lead to the threat of city-wide catastrophe, resolved only with the help of a once-famous ’90s wrestler. No matter what happens around them, Kenny and Keith always remain totally, bizarrely unfazed. Raised in North Carolina, the Lucas brothers perform comedy all over the country and were selected as members of the New Faces of Comedy at the 2012 Montreal Just For Laughs comedy festival.
